Thank you. Good evening, everyone.

On behalf of MedPlus, it's my utmost pleasure to welcome you all to MedPlus Q4 FY26 earnings conference call to discuss the financial results of MedPlus for the financial year FY26, which were announced earlier. We have with us today the senior management represented by our CFO, Mr.

Sujit Mahato. Before we begin, I would like to mention that some of the statements made in today's discussion may be forward-looking in nature and may involve risks and uncertainties.

Please note the disclaimer mentioning these risks and uncertainties on slide one of the investor presentation shared with all of you earlier. Documents relating to our financial performance were circulated earlier and these have also been posted on our corporate website.

I would now handover the call to Sujit. Thank you and over to you, Sujit.

Thank you, Srinivas, and good evening, everyone on this call. The update on our network with regards to openings and closures, the company opened 618 stores net additions during the year.

During the current quarter, we have opened 295 outlets, and there were 77 store closures, including 18 related to relocation cases and 13 franchise outlet closures. We achieved a net addition of 218 stores during the quarter compared to the 182 stores added during the last quarter.

For FY27, company plans to open 800 net new stores, including franchise outlets. An update on our network in terms of the age of our stores network, around 24% of our stores have been operational for less than two years, and the remaining 76% of our stores have been operational for two years or more.

On the store size of our network, at the end of the quarter, our network grew to 5,330 stores with 2.8 million plus square feet compared to 4,712 stores and 2.4 million square feet at the end of March '25. The average store size is 528 square feet.

On the revenue mix, presently the company offers a large range of SKUs spanning across pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical categories. Private label sales for Q4 FY26 constitute 22%, pharma being 11.4% and non-pharma constituting 10.6% of our total revenues.

Our consolidated revenue for the quarter is 18,644 million. Our consolidated operating EBITDA for the quarter stood at 1,076 million, representing 5.8%.

Revenue from pharmacy operations grew by 23.4% YoY on reported basis. The pharmacy operating EBITDA stood at 1,022 million, representing 5.6%.

An update on our store performance, stores older than 12 months, revenue from these stores in quarter four was 16,606 million, representing 96% of pharmacy revenue. These stores had a store-level EBITDA margin of 13.1%.

A word here on the store-level EBITDA margin by age, while stores greater than 12 months had a margin of 13.1%, this was 13.3% for stores greater than 24 months and 9.3% for stores in the 13 to 24 months age bracket. On allocating all non-store related costs, the operating EBITDA of stores greater than 12 months would be 1,133 million, which translates to a margin of 6.7%.

An update on the working capital, our net working capital for quarter four was 53 days. The inventory in our warehouse was 30 days.

In Q4, the inventory level of our first year stores was 112 days. In comparison, for our stores older than 12 months, the inventory was 36 days.

There has been a corrigendum, and would like to update: in slide three of our investor presentation, request you to please read operating cash flows as ₹4,956 million instead of 917 million for the full year FY26, and OCF by operating EBITDA ratio as 135.5% instead of 85.2% for the full year FY26. On our diagnostics numbers, diagnostics revenue for the year is ₹1,309.9 million, and operating EBITDA is ₹196 million.

Diagnostics revenue for the current quarter grew to 347.8 million compared to 280.8 million in quarter four FY25. Diagnostics segment recorded an operating EBITDA of 53.1 million, representing 15.3% compared to ₹34.3 million in quarter four of FY25.

In January, we sold 537 gross plans per day. In Feb and March, this was 603 and 554 respectively.

As on 31st March, we had around 2 lakh active plans. Our current observed on-time renewal rate was 21% in quarter four versus 23% in quarter three.

That concludes our update for the quarter. I request the host to open the line for questions.

Hi, sir. Thank you for the opportunity and congratulations on a good set of numbers.

My first question would be, our number of store closures is continuously on an increasing trend. How one should view this, and also our franchising model store withdrawal is also on uptick?

Can you throw some light on this, on your input on this?

Sure, thank you. Thank you for your question.

In terms of our store closures, this quarter we had a few stores also closed down which relates to the performance. We waited for three-year-plus stores, and where we felt that we were not able to revive them to the level of company's expectations, around 26 to 27 stores we closed down.

Rest all, we had given the reasons in the investor deck. Okay.

Sir, my another question would be, in the previous concalls we have highlighted that we are rearranging our sales with which our private share had significantly decline in Q4 FY26. Going forward, as our previous guidance of increasing private label by 20 to 30 basis points every quarter-on-quarter, is that guidance intact or how should we view the private label share going up going forward?

I think that guidance continues to be intact. What we did for the last two quarters is stabilize the overall growth, where we also had to balance out between the branded products as well as the private label sales, where we had informed the investors that we were restructuring the incentives.

Now we have seen that it's working the way we expected, and we'll be back to the trajectory where we had promised that every quarter we can expect that kind of a growth on the private label as well.

Thank you so much, sir. My last question would be, the current growth in the revenue and the margin, how can we expect in the FY27 as well, or how should we view that margin and revenue growth going forward?

See,

as a principle the company does not give guidance, but there is no reason to believe that we will not continue in the same manner.

Thank you so much, sir. Thank you.

All the best. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks for taking my question. The 800 new stores that you have guided for next year, how do you split between your own stores and franchising, and what was this split for 600-odd stores that you opened in FY26?

Saion, for the current year, out of the 600, around 310-odd stores we have done the franchisee model. Again, where we had guided that we will do an experiment on this, we continued to do that and continue to refine the model.

The second part is on the next year. As we speak, I don't have the split of that, Saion, but as we progress, maybe we will share that information.

At the moment, it is 800 which includes both the company stores as well as the franchisee outlets.

Understood. Just to understand the impact of this, overall of the 5,000-odd stores you have, total franchisee would be now just around 300, right?

Because this is the first year you had meaningfully added franchisee stores. That's the right

Correct. The old ones and the new ones all put together should be in the range of 500 now, 500 plus.

Okay. Okay.

These new addition of franchisee should not be a drag on your profitability? Is that a right assessment?

Because it would be in the books of the Correct. See,

the original model was that while the company stores continue to grow and we venture into franchisee as a faster growth adjacency, we will be able to make significant or sufficient margin what we were making with the company-owned stores at the store level. We are in the same, I would say, trajectory or direction.

The only additional good point is, in our own company-owned stores, at least for the year one, we were making losses and then we were slowly climbing up. In the franchisee model, right from day one, we are in green.

Understood. One observation that your margins have been increasing, for stores greater than 12 months, if I call them mature stores, at store level 13% margin and operating level 6.7%.

You also mentioned private label, which sort of got stagnated a bit, will start to grow again. Then now you have franchisee also adding, where should we see operating EBITDA margin over the course of the next three, five years if you can help us think through?

See, at least for the next one year, the way we have been discussing internally is we would first try to stabilize this and maybe deliver again the same 5.7%, 5.8%, and then keep growing. The plan is to add more assortment on the private label non-pharma side as well, because there we believe the skies the limit.

Traditionally we have been lower on that count when compared to our other peers and competitors. That is one area which the company would focus in the current fiscal and going forward, that on a rupee absolute basis how can we keep adding the private label non-pharma, which will definitely add to the top line as well as to the bottom line.

Okay. Just one last question if I can ask, is there any impact of GLP-1 launches or any comments that you have on that particular market and anything for MedPlus which can be a positive here?

We did not track at that level, Saion. Maybe we will do a separate deep dive and maybe we'll come back to you.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah. On GLP, how is your cold chain storage kind of set up?

Do you have enough in terms of warehouses and transport trucks? You have that setup already kind of built up?

To be honest,

I think, Sudarshan, we always had that infrastructure in place, because we were earlier also handling the injectables, the vaccines, and other products. There was no surprise element on that.

Only thing, as I mentioned just now to the other person, that I've not tracked that data separately. Beyond this, I'll not be able to comment momentarily.

Got it. In terms of your store addition plans, right?

You highlighted around 800-odd stores. A couple of years back also, we had added quite a lot of stores and then we had to add warehouses.

Where do you see the headroom till where you will have to add more and more warehouses from the current levels?

It depends again on what we had explained earlier. As we move into newer states, we would for sure need new warehouses.

For this set of 800 stores, and if it is predominantly we concentrate in the existing state, then I believe not many additions of warehouse would be required. We have enough headroom.

As we progress into the adjacent states of MP and Chhattisgarh, where we started feeding stores in the previous years, there we may need to plan a few warehouses that will be much lower when compared to the current year additions what we have done.

Got it. On the accounting side, you had a 30 bps improvement in gross margins this quarter on a Q-on-Q basis.

If I look at your product mix in terms of private label, it has gone slightly down itself. What is driving this sequential improvement in gross margins?

Absolutely, your observation is right. The other income component, which has gone up in this quarter, and also a bump up on the pharma membership income.

What we have observed is there are certain contracts with suppliers where we have an arrangement upfront where we can accrue over the years based on the performance. There are suppliers where there exists no contract, but based on the overall performance of the year when we negotiate with them and we are able to get some benefit, so that is only taken again at the end of the quarter, but basis the units sold.

For example, if we had procured a million units during the year and we have got X amount, and out of that 60% have already been sold, to the extent of 60% we get the credit in the quarter. That's been where we have seen some positive benefit which we had to accrue in the current fiscal year.

Got it. Got it.

One last question. Given that you are kind of exploring this franchise model, historically you have followed more of a densification strategy in your four, five states or seven-odd states.

With franchise model, I believe you may be able to go more into pan-India basis. Should we kind of assume as and when you pick up more franchisees, the expansion in other states will kind of pick up pace?

At least immediately we have not listed down any new states, but those states where we just started feeding stores in the previous one year or two years, we would definitely like to expand there through the franchisee route. We will continue the densification program, as you rightly highlighted, in the existing states, because there's still room to be covered.

As we go into new states, we will inform the market.

Got it. Got it.

That's it from my side. Thanks.

Thank you. Thank you, Sudarshan.

Thank you for the opportunity. Similar question on the franchisee model.

There are a lot of moving parts in the business. I am assuming first of all you'll have certain investments to be made in terms of fixed assets, and a partner will be making some fixed asset investment.

Then there is inventory component which probably will be lying on with the franchisee partner already, and you have to account it and maybe clean up some of it. Can you give little more clarity in terms of your franchisee business model, how you are looking at return on fixed asset investments and as well as inventory management?

You spoke about the margins part, which is clear that there's no break-even timeline in terms of margins, and from first year it'll be profitable, but balance sheet side is little unclear.

When we try setting up a franchisee outlet, as you rightly highlighted, the capex is being invested by the company. Let's say we spend 10 lakhs per store for setting up the complete capex, including fit-outs.

Then on the inventory, the franchisee purchases that inventory from MedPlus on day one, so that's an outright sale for us. When we look at margins, the way we are looking at currently, let's say the gross margin today at the pharmacy level is 24%, that is distributed between the franchisee and MedPlus.

Same MedPlus continues to retain 10% or 9.5%, and the franchisee is given 14%, 14.5%. The way it is done is, if earlier we were selling a product at 100, we would now sell that product at 85, for example, to the franchisee, and the franchisee would sell at 100 and make that 15 as margin.

We would be making that delta margin of 9.5% to 10% when we sell the inventory to the franchisee.

In terms of existing inventory with the franchisee partner, we don't have any connection with that then? Is that right understanding?

Again, it depends. If it's a new franchisee, the entire inventory is purchased.

If it's an old franchisee, depending on case-to-case basis, there are instances we completely acquire the inventory and then completely replenish the entire inventory by a new sale. Those are case-to-case basis where there are conversions from a mom-and-pop to MedPlus outlet.

Otherwise, as you rightly said, if it's a new store, complete inventory is sold by us. There is no other inventory which the franchisee is allowed to procure from outside.

Sure. For the existing stores where you get into a franchisee model, you will be sort of writing off some inventories, I'm assuming, because their way of valuing and our way of valuing may have some difference.

Is that fair way to look at it?

We have not observed any such differences, just to clarify.

Okay. Lastly, in terms of margins, gross margin is pretty clear.

It is roughly 9.5%, 10%. Then the translation from gross to EBITDA, I am assuming it to be much higher in franchisee model than the existing model.

The way to look at it is after the store-level EBITDA of 9.5%, 10%, there's no other cost associated with it. That gets accretive to the company's margin directly.

Okay. Got it.

Sure. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. One question on the franchisee which you just mentioned.

So 9% to 10% gross margin that we have is net of supply chain cost, or supply chain cost to deliver it to them is separately charged and therefore the EBITDA becomes, let's say, 6%

to 8%? You are right.

It is separately charged, which is currently the model which we present, where we say that after the store-level EBITDA there is the PSD, which is the warehouse-related and marketing cost, and then the corporate and other cost, which gives the company-level EBITDA. Similarly, whatever we now articulated is the store-level EBITDA in franchisee model less the supply-related cost of, let's say, 2.5%, 3%, and then the net is the company-level EBITDA, which gets added to the company's bottom line.

Got it. There is no marketing fee that we charge them, because, let's say, we advertise for MedPlus?

It's included in that. Yeah.

Got it. The second question was, in the deck we have mentioned around 13 stores of franchisee had closed in this quarter.

What would be the reason for them to withdraw?

Various reasons. Some of them are new business entrepreneurs.

They get into it with a certain set of expectations. Very soon, within the first two months, they understand maybe it's not meeting their expectations.

It is very normal that we will see such closures.

The average age that we have mentioned is about almost two years. I understand, okay, one or two might be, let's say, two-month experiment done by people and realized.

Some are also the old-model franchisee stores which have closed down.

Got it. For a new franchisee model, have we seen any, let's say, quick closure?

A few, here and there, we have seen. Yes, we have seen.

Got it. Not, let's say, significant to

No, absolutely.

Understood. The third question was that I'm a consumer of MedPlus products, I was looking through the app, I saw there is a DBH Biscuits, then there is non-pharma non-eatable products, and the manufacturer was mentioned as Optival.

From being, let's say, a trading company that typically a pharmacist is, right, from a trading company we also are becoming a manufacturing company. What is the thought process of, let's say, manufacturing all of these own, specially, let's say, here at least there is no, let's say, regulatory FDA standards that need to be met.

The cost arbitrage assumption is would be lesser. What's the thought process of manufacturing these items by ourselves?

Some of the items, absolutely you're right. Wherever possible, we completely get into a full backward integration mode.

In Optival also, we have set up, I think if you're referring to the food items or the bakery products, we are doing the own manufacturing only. Some of the non-pharma products also, like cleaning liquid, some toilet stuff, and other stuff is also being manufactured.

We have our own factory. Wherever we do not have the capacity to manufacture, we do go to the best-in-class contract manufacturers for both pharma and non-pharma and get our stuff done there.

Is there a, let's say, thought process, as you were saying, right, non-pharma expansion there is a whole blue ocean available, blue sky available, that we will over a period of time aim to manufacture all non-pharma private label products in-house and

I would not say all, but wherever there is an opportunity, company is completely open to explore that. As and when we do that, we will keep informing the market.

Got it. Just last question, I think you've partially answered, but let's say the 12-month-plus stores EBITDA margin is 6.

point 6.7 versus, let's say, 5.8 for Q4 FY25. There is no one-off that is leading to a jump here, because that way it's a very steep jump.

There's no one-off. I can confirm that.

Got it. Thank you.

I'll join back the queue.

Thank you.

Hello, can you hear me, sir?

Yes, please. Sir,

my first question is regarding private label. Sir, just wanted to understand why we are still at 22%, 23% of the total sales, and what is our near-term target, let's say, for next year or next two, three years for private label?

The private label has two components, both the pharma and the FMCG part. On the pharma, we have been mindful the way we are growing.

On the non-pharma, absolutely the scope is unlimited. On the pharma also, that way the scope is unlimited, but there it is also linked to the customer's behavior and their aptitude to convert to a private label rather than only the brand.

Whereas in the non-pharma, that uptake is very fast and we have slowly continuously started adding more assortment of products, which is going to help us going forward as well. That's the only reason.

Otherwise, you are right. We do not have a specific number in mind for a target, but continuously we would focus on that and keep growing.

Sir, another part, how do we manage unsold inventory under the private label? Do we bear the cost entirely?

Yes, your observation is right. On the private label, the entire inventory risk of expiry and write-offs is on our books.

Sir. That's it for now.

Hi, sir. Good evening and congratulations on the good set of numbers.

A couple of questions here. Sir, we saw that the gross and the EBITDA margins for FY26 were at 26% and 8.8%.

Just wanted to have a bit of a color on how should we look at the trajectory going forward? That was my first question.

On the second question, sir, we noted the SSSG growth of 17.8% for mature stores, that is stores greater than 12 months. Going ahead for FY27 on an annual basis, where do you see the SSSG rate as well?

Thank you.

Thank you for your question. On the first question, what was the reference?

Sorry.

It was on gross and EBITDA margin trajectory going forward.

We do not give any specific guidance, but we expect at least to maintain the same level of gross margin. As and when we see further improvements in the share of private label, that should be accretive to our gross margins.

Sir. Sir, on the SSSG?

On the SSSG, very clearly we had articulated a couple of quarters ago that we would aim for 9% to 10% on an annualized basis, while we strongly believe that SSSG is not the only metric which we need to track, at least for a pharmacy kind of a setup. From a number perspective, we still believe that we will be able to continue to clock at least 9% to 10% on an annual basis.

All right, sir. Thank you, sir.

That's it.

Thank you.

Yeah. Hi, good evening and thanks for the opportunity.

My first question is on your capital allocation. How are you thinking about it, because what I see you are saying is you have stores which give you fantastic ROCEs, and there you are kind of letting the franchisee invest.

Then on private label, kind of non-pharma side, you want to manufacture yourself, where I'm assuming the ROCEs will not be as attractive as your stores. How is the thought process kind of being run?

While ROCE, you're right, we'll have to track at the company level. The capital allocation is a dynamic part of that.

Capital allocation will continue to be at what we think is where we can do a better job vis-a-vis a contract manufacturer. Company would continuously focus on where we can add more value, add more products, bring in more assortment, bring in more reliability to the supply chain.

That being said, we are completely very mindful of how we allocate capital so that we get the optimum return for the shareholders.

A kind of continuation of the same question. A few years back, two, three years back, you were adding 800 stores on your own, and at that time your balance sheet, the company level ROCE was not as strong as it is today.

Why is the thought process of now kind of going aggressively with franchisees versus earlier doing it yourself?

That's the whole reason of evaluation between adding, let's say, another 20,000 stores where you need to manage additional manpower of, let's say, 25,000 people vis-a-vis expanding aggressively through the franchisee route, getting in micro-entrepreneurs who can manage, let's say, 5 to 10 stores on their own, and thereby continuously growing this by making the MedPlus brand stronger, getting better products offering, and making it more and more affordable to the customers.

Got it. That makes sense.

Just one more question. You said your gross margins will expand going forward as the private label contribution increases, but EBITDA margins you're looking to largely maintain at the current rate.

Are there any specific areas where you are kind of intending to spend that the gross margin improvement will not translate to EBITDA margin improvement?

No, I've not mentioned that. Very mindfully we'll have to only calibrate that what I mentioned is we would first ensure or at least target to maintain the current profitability.

If you look at our historical numbers, we have continuously improved. First is we need to stabilize this and then continue to grow, and that will be the journey way forward.

Got it. Thanks a lot.

This quarter was fantastic. Hope to see similar results going forward as well.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Sir, congrats on a good operating set of numbers.

Sir, partly my question on asset allocation is addressed. Then the question is, sir, with free cash flow coming in since last two years net of lease payment liability as well, what are your thoughts about kind of sharing this via dividend, which is one of the strongest signal that company doesn't need the capital and we are generating the free cash flow?

One, why are we not still there? That's question number one.

I understand you'll have a lot of growth aspiration and growth capital, we are making decent ROCE. Just your thoughts there, sir, as a signaling.

Second, sir, given our omnichannel, you did mention about how we can do a better job vis-a-vis only online kind of a store. The question is expanding our network in tier three, where maybe online may not make a lot of sense, versus growth through online, if you can give us some sense and flavor of how we're planning to grow existing store online, and going tier two, tier three, which, obviously we can do both, but where is the growth prospects much much better and much faster?

Hello, am I audible? Hello?

Ladies and gentlemen, the line for the management has been disconnected. Please hold while we get them back.

Hi. Am I audible?

Yes, please. Can you please repeat the question?

Sir. I'll just quickly summarize my question.

Sir, partly the asset allocation on own store versus franchisee you have addressed. The question is then, sir, with free cash flow coming even after payment of lease liability, how about giving a dividend signal, which is one of the strongest we as an investor believe is a good signal that even after working capital and repayment and capex need, we're generating a free cash flow and there are no major debts to take care because there are lease liability, which at least Ind AS shows it as debt.

How about thinking on those lines, which we have not yet kind of probably taken action? Second, sir, quickly on online growth through the existing channels versus growing in tier two, tier three towns where maybe online may not be probably so strong, we'll do maybe focus on more store-level thing.

Where is the growth more coming from, getting more out of online in the existing store versus going in tier two, tier three, sir?

Thank you for the question. On the dividend, for sure we have not yet reached that stage is what we believe.

I'll take your question, we'll discuss it internally. See, the juncture at which the company stands, that there is huge headroom for the company to grow and invest.

We have not taken that call yet, but I take your question back and we'll discuss with the senior management and the board. The second on the online growth versus the physical growth, for us we continue to grow more in the tier two, tier three, if I can answer you.

Sir. Sir, just to understand the online thing in slightly more detail, in slightly more flavor, how is it going, How is it as a percentage of existing store-level economics, how's it adding some flavor there?

For us, online is not a direct focus or a channel where we drive sales, but it's been there for the company since 2014 as an additional convenience to the customers, where the customers can order online, pick up while going back home, going from office, they pick up from our store. Some of them really take the full benefit of ordering online and getting them delivered at the home.

It is 5% plus of our current total sales.

Got it. Two-hour delivery is more like giving a comfort that you will get the thing that you want, if not immediately then maybe within two hours, something like that.

Absolutely. Wherever our stores are physically available, online service is available.

That's how we operate online. Where we do not have in a particular pin code, let's say there is or in a particular city where we do not have a physical presence, we do not offer online.

Sure, sir. Thanks.

All the best and thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, sir. Can you hear me?

Yes,

Raman. Yeah.

I just have two questions. One with respect to private label.

In the opening commentary, you mentioned that you have achieved a good mix between branded and private label growth, and you are looking to focus in the coming year on the private label products. Can you expect the initial guidance of growing your private label portfolio, which is both your pharmacy and non-pharmacy, 1% every quarter?

No, we do not give such kind of a guidance, but yeah, as we grow, we had earlier indicated that for every 0.3% we will have a 0.1% impact on the gross margin. For that, I said, yes, that guidance still remains, but we do not give guidance on how much we will grow because it has a couple of dynamic factors.

One being the customer's behavior, and two, the company's efforts in getting more and more assortment and portfolio of products both on the pharma as well as on the non-pharma. As we continue to progress, we will keep updating the market, but as such we do not provide any guidance.

Understood. Just a follow-up on this.

About two quarters back, you are planning to focus on overall growth of the stores over the growing of only private label, aggressively expanding into private label products. How is the narrative right now for the management?

Now also are you sticking towards the overall balanced growth, or are you planning to go aggressively for the private label growth?

No, we will continue to be very balanced in terms of growth because we being a multi-brand retail outlet, to continue to offer the full scale of branded products. We do not want a customer who walks in and asks for a particular brand, be it on the pharma or non-pharma, to say that we do not have that.

That behavior is what the company worked at in the last couple of quarters, and I think we would continue that journey saying that private label will also grow, but branded will continue to be completely focused, and overall growth makes more sense rather than only private label, because that's been what we have learned in the last couple of years.

Understood, sir. Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah. Hi, Sujit.

Congratulations on a strong set. Sujit, firstly, I wanted to understand that the SSSG that we have seen this quarter has been probably the strongest in 12, 13 quarters.

Is there anything that you would have done that you can call out because in the middle you guys had tweaked the incentives at a store level to incentivize the employees to sell private label, then you had rolled that back a little bit. Any color here?

Aejas, I think while the numbers speak for themselves, we shared our views with you earlier as well and with all other participants that really SSSG is not the number which we track. Yes, if you see the consequences of certain initiatives which the company has been pursuing, yes, we have seen numbers in this range, and that's the reason on an annual basis when other participants had asked me, what we had said at best is what we guided earlier also is 9% to 10% when the numbers were very low, if you remember that a few quarters ago.

I think we did not do anything special, if I can answer you that. What we in particular ensured is the availability of the full assortment of non-pharma products and pharma products wherever possible, and we saw good uptake in the FMCG products as well, which helped us on the overall number.

Understood. Secondly, Sujit, could you just call out is it possible that you can give the franchisee revenues that you've booked for the year, and going forward is it possible to give the breakdown of the store addition, own stores and franchisee stores?

I'll share with that maybe after this call, because I don't have it handy. Once we reach a critical mass, we will again re-evaluate what amount of subdivisional data we can share.

Absolutely.

Understood. Thirdly, Sujit, in terms of you spoke at the start of the call about your desires to improve the PL non-pharma a bit.

Could you just tell me on this front three elements: one is what categories; second is that any visit to your existing stores feels that there is no incremental space available for storage, if there is a slew of more PL non-pharma products, how do you intend to create incremental store space to manage some of this; and third is the margin profile for typically the PL non-pharma, could you just give some color about how is it in compared to PL pharma?

Sure. In terms of the categories, across every category in a retail store, we are re-looking at the assortment, and wherever possible, either we are bringing in more branded stuff or we are parallelly evaluating and adding more and more private label new products, be it in edible oils, any health sector, any health-related food supplements.

That is one. Second, what you rightly observed, there are stores where our space is constrained, but there are many other stores where we strongly believe that there's enough room to add more and more products to the same footage.

That's where, I think, even during the current year, we have a project to, I would say, upgrade or modernize at least 600-plus stores to accommodate more and more. That is smart way of storing, the rack system, and the pharma and non-pharma demarcation right which can be serviced from behind the counter and which can be serviced or left out in the open.

Those are the certain stuff we are again carrying out this year. The last one, what you mentioned, in terms of the margin profile, for sure the private label pharma commands a much higher margin.

The private label non-pharma margins are in the range of 23% to 25% at the gross margin level, which are significantly better than the non-pharma branded products, which are in the range of maybe 9% to 10%.

Understood. Broadly just one last thing is that has there been any broad change in your acute and chronic mix, say, over the last two or three years?

We have not seen that change yet, Aejas.

Understood. Thanks and all the best.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Thank you for the follow-up.

First question is, the inventory days that we mention in our slide deck, right, for more than 12 months and less than 12 months, just a formula check, the inventory is what is in our balance sheet, but does the sale or the COGS is only for the COCO store or it includes franchisee or how should we understand?

The inventory on our balance sheet only relates to COCO stores. Franchisee, the day it is sold, it is their inventory.

When we compute the number of days, in the denominator, well,

we take COCO,

right? Inventory is at COCO, but in the denominator

In the COCO stores. You are right.

Here only COCO stores' numbers have been taken on both sides, just to clarify.

Got it. That is helpful.

Second is, you mentioned that, let's say, earlier when we were discussing, that 9 to 10 is what we get as gross margin when we do a franchise sale. Right now, let's say, 500 stores are there, and if I just take 300 that were done last year and add another 300 for next year, about 800 stores out of 6,000-odd some stores becomes franchisee stores.

Now the question is franchisee margin is 9 to 10 for us, whereas COCO will be at 24. Now as the percentage of franchisee store increase, the margin should come down, whereas you are expecting the margin to remain similar.

Does it mean that the goodness from private label increase more or less gets sort of nullified by the increase in franchisee at least at the gross margin level?

Just only one point I would like to add so that it is apple to apple. What you rightly mentioned is gross margin currently is 24%, and the store-level EBITDA is at a company level 11%, right?

That 11 you should compare with 9.5, 10. As the percentage of private label also increases in my franchisee outlet, this will also continue to improve.

That's what we meant.

Got it. You're saying EBITDA will remain same, maybe the gross margin might show up lesser, but you are saving on other cost.

Yeah.

Got it. The last question, GLP products have been launched, let's say, in our stores.

What would be the revenue that, let's say, it contributed in this quarter? I was not there in the opening side if you had mentioned it.

No, I have not mentioned. I said we are not tracking that immediately.

Yes, from an availability, all the products of all the brands are available at our stores.

Got it. Is there a timeline for store generic of these products, or right now it's going to be branded generics only?

As of now, we have not launched any store level for this GLP-1, but as and when we launch, we will surely inform the market.

Got it. Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Hello, sir. Audible, sir?

Yes, please. You are audible.

Sir, mera question yeh hai, sir, hum na FY26 ke andar humne 120 crore ka interest pay kiya hai, sir. Aur 1,400 crore ka loan hai, sir.

Uske bare mein kya sochna hai management ka ki use kam karna chahiye ya nahi karna chahiye? Yeh interest jo aap dekh rahe hain P&L

mein,

this is all related to lease accounting and hamare books mein koi external loan nahi hai. Woh

bhi

lease liability ke tehat pe Ind AS ke niche woh dikhaya ja raha hai. Actual loan kahin nahi hai books mein.

It's a zero debt company. Aur jo interest, haan, bataiye.

Jo

yeh interest hai, sir, 120 CR ka?

Yeah. It is all about lease accounting, where the lease rental is subdivided into interest and depreciation.

Okay. Samajh gaya, sir.

Sir, aage jaake margin double digit mein aayenge ya kaise hoga,

sir? Uske bare mein koi guidance?

Hum guidance dete nahi hain. As explained earlier, what we will ensure is to first maintain the current level of profitability and then continue to grow.

Theek hai, sir. Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Yeah. Hi, I just had one question.

Your warehouse inventory has been continuously improving. What is the sustainable level of warehouse inventory?

30 30 days is what you reported last quarter, that seems fairly industry best.

I think, Govind, this would be in the range of 30 to 33 days. We have been dabbling, but we have not cut out on any tail brands as such.

At a point in time when private label really takes off, we will re-look at the entire SKUs which we are carrying. For example, today as you are aware, for every molecule there are at least 200-plus brands available, and depending on the physical locations of our stores, we try to fulfill the demands of those particular pin codes for the same molecules which are generated there, and therefore we are also forced to maintain all the tail brands plus the MedPlus brand.

A point in time if, let's say, MedPlus reaches 40 40-plus percent, we would definitely re-look at the tail brands and maybe reduce a few to reduce this number, which can help us also on the overall working capital. For now, we think we will continue with the same level, Govind.

Okay. Sorry, if I could squeeze in one more question.

Typically what is the percentage of returns that you give back to pharma companies either because of expiries or damages, and how long does it sit as inventory on your books, and how long does it take for the payment to come back from the pharma companies?

Generally it is done only on expiries, returns to the pharma companies, especially on the branded products. I would say less than a month we get reimbursed up to 95%.

Okay. Typically how long is the inventory holding period for you, and what proportion of either the value of sales or whatever is typically returned?

Would it be 5%, 10%, would it be higher?

It would be less than 1%, Govind.

It's less than 1%?

Yeah.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

I thank all participants on this call for your interest in the MedPlus journey. Our investor relations team can be contacted at [email protected].

Thank you and have a good day.